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(upbeat music) - Want to welcome you to our last day, day five together of our
look through Matthew chapter 15. We're going to take another look at the feeding of
the 4,000 today. In fact, this whole miracle of what happened in the feeding of
the 5,000 and 4,000 and what you and I can learn.

There's so much to be learned. We're going to learn some more even next week about
this. For years here at Saddleback Church, we have looked at the feeding of the
5,000 and 4,000 to help people to see what to do when you need a miracle in your
life.

We've been talking this week a lot about your ministry to others, removing the
barriers in our own lives that keep us from getting the good news out to those
who need to hear. Today, I'd like to look more personally at this passage
because I know you may need a miracle. You may very well need a miracle in a
relationship or in your finances or in your health or in your work or career or
ministry, a miracle in your life.

God to be working, God to be doing what only he can do. So let me read again the
passage that we looked at yesterday. And then we're going to talk about four things
that you do based on this passage, based on the feeding of the 5,000 and the
4,000 when you're looking for a miracle.

Beginning again in verse 29. Jesus left there and went along the Sea of Galilee.
Then he went up on a mountainside and sat down.

Great crowds came to him, bringing the lame and blind and crippled and mute and
many others and laid them at his feet and he healed them. The people were amazed
when they saw the mute speaking. The crippled made well, the lame walking, the
blind seeing, and they praised the God of Israel.

Jesus called the disciples to him and said, "I have compassion for these people.
"They've already been with me three days "and have nothing to eat. "I do not
want to send them away hungry "or they may collapse on the way.

" His disciples answered, "Where could we get enough bread "in this remote place
to feed such a crowd? "How many loaves do you have? " Jesus asked.

"Seven," they replied, "and a few small fish. " He told the crowd to sit down on
the ground. And then he took the seven loaves and the fish and when he had given
thanks, he broke them and he gave them to the disciples and they in turn to the
people.

And they all ate and were satisfied. Afterward, the disciples picked up seven
basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. The number of those who ate was
4,000 besides women and children.

After Jesus had sent the crowd away, he got into the boat and went to the
vicinity of Magadan. So what are the four things that you do when you need a
miracle? Well, number one, you admit.

I admit that I have a need. That's the starting place. If I want God to work in
my life, I got to admit it.

God, I need your help. Now for a lot of us, this is difficult. We don't like to
admit our problems.

Truth is, we like to hide our problems, even from ourselves, cover up our
problems, blame other people for our problems. Pretend our problems don't exist.
The first principle of this story is that God doesn't work in your life until
you're able to admit the problem and ask for his help.

Ask and it shall be given to you. Over 20 times in the New Testament, we're
commanded to ask. So you come to Jesus and you say, Jesus, I have this need in
my life.

I need a miracle. God won't help until you admit that you need help for it. Now
we don't do this many times because we have these self-defeating behaviors.

And we see some of them in the lives of the disciples here. Sometimes we tend to
procrastinate. Sometimes we tend to worry.

And in this story, you see these self-defeating behaviors that kept them from
watching out, watching God do this miracle. The first thing they did is they
procrastinated. Three days in this case.

They just put off dealing with the problem. They delayed it. They waited until
too late in the day and then another day and another day and another day.

They could have figured out these people were hungry. They had figured it out
and they'd seen Jesus do a miracle before but they kept putting it off. And we
do this with a lot of our problems.

We pretend they don't exist. We look the other way. We procrastinate.

It's that whole thing of putting your homework off until the last minute or
putting your taxes off until the very last minute. Procrastination never solves
the problem. Never solves the problem.

What it does is it makes the problems worse. Another thing that we do is we
worry. We worry about our problems.

The disciples, where are we going to get enough bread? It doesn't seem like they're
asking with faith here. They should.

They've seen Jesus do this before but once again they're worrying about how is
this going to happen. They had forgotten about who was with them. They'd forgotten
about what Jesus had already done.

Jesus Christ, the Son of God is there. The bread of life is there. The one who
can turn stones into bread.

He's standing right there. Jesus is standing there and they're looking for a
Kentucky Fried Chicken. Jesus is standing there and they're looking for a
McDonald's.

Jesus Christ is there. Jesus, the one who'd already done it. Many times I do
this, you do this, we have a problem and we forget that God is right there to
help with the problem.

God who says I will help you if you'll just come to me but it begins by
admitting that I have a need. Second thing you do is you assess what you already
have. Do you think through what do I have to work with?

Some realistic analysis of the resources I have. You say what do I have? How
many loaves do you have?

Now why did Jesus do this? He's God. He could have rained manna down from
heaven.

Why would he say go and see what you've got? Because there's a second principle
here when you need a miracle in your life. First you admit the need and second
you assess what you have to work with.

The second principle is God always starts with what you have. You take the
energy you have, you give it to him. Take the time you have, you give it to him.

The money you have, you give it to him. The relationship you have, the talent
you have, you give that to him. You say God here's what I have, you evaluate
that.

Jesus says to the disciples, you give them something to eat, you feed them. How
would you like to be a disciple in this case? These thousands upon thousands,
over 10,000 people, they're all hungry.

Why don't you take care of the problem? Jesus asked them to assess what the need
was by looking at the problem and looking what they had. And when they did that,
they realized it's impossible.

It is humanly impossible. And that's what Jesus wanted them to realize. It's
impossible except by the power of God.

Has God ever asked you to do anything impossible? If you've been a believer for
any length of time, he probably has. Because God likes to ask, he loves to ask
his children to do the impossible because he wants to stretch your faith.

He wants to test you. He wants to see that you are trustworthy with what he has
given. Jesus is testing their faith here.

He's testing their hearts here. He's helping them to see how to trust him in
this situation. When you face a situation, a struggle, you've got to think
through admitting what the problem is.

Then you've got to look and see, okay, God, what have you given me? What do I
have in my hands? But then there's a third thing you have to do.

And that is you give God whatever you have. You see what you have and then you
give God what you have. Here it's seven loaves and a few fish.

The feeding of the 5,000, it was five loaves and two fish. The book of John
tells us that it was one small boy who brought his lunch and gave that. Others
probably had food in these crowds, but it was the one who gave by faith who
enabled the miracle to happen, who had the blessing of the miracle.

The little boy who gave, whoever gave in the feeding of the 4,000, these people
were the heroes, not because they had the biggest meal or the best meal, but
because they gave their meal to God. They gave it to Jesus. Here's what I got,
some rolls, a couple of fish.

Lord, you can have these. They gave God what they had and look at what God did.
The third principle is God uses whatever I give him.

In verse 36 and 37, he took the seven loaves and the fish and when he had given
thanks, he broke them, gave them to the disciples, they interred to the people,
and they all ate and were satisfied. God will use whatever you give him. He will
take it, he will use it.

He likes to use ordinary things to do extraordinary things. He likes to use
ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary tasks. And these people, they gave
willingly, they gave immediately.

That's the kind of giving that sparks a miracle. Then you do a fourth thing.
Fourth thing that you do is you expect him to multiply it.

You give it to him and then you expect him to multiply it. Now this is the
hardest step, I think, for long-time believers. We oftentimes have learned to
give to God, but we haven't learned to have the faith to expect.

We know sometimes that it's wrong to demand that God work in a certain way, but
we also sometimes forget that we have to expect God to work when we have faith.
Expect God to multiply whatever you give to him. With the feeding of the 5,000,
12 baskets left over.

4,000, seven baskets left over. Now in both cases, the expectation wasn't
necessarily for the person who gave. They gave, God multiplied it, and it meant
everybody else was blessed and the disciples took the baskets that were left
over.

So it's not always a selfish expectation. Many times God will bless your life in
powerful ways, but he also will bless other people's lives in amazing ways. So
you look and you think, what do I not have enough of in my life?

Whatever I don't have enough of, I want to give it to God. You don't have enough
time, you give it to God. You don't have enough money, you give it to God.

You don't have enough relationships, you give that area of your life to God.
Whatever you give totally to God, he multiplies it. He blesses it in return.

God has set up the world with this principle of sowing and reaping. Whatever you
sow is what you're going to reap. So if you sow criticism, you're going to get back
criticism.

But if you sow encouragement, if you give away encouragement, you're going to get
back encouragement. If you give your time to help others, God blesses your time.
If you give your money, your talents to help others, God blesses those in
return.

God wants to teach you to become a giver because God's a giver. God so loved the
world that he gave. And you always reap back whatever you sow.

That's the principle of reaping and sowing. That's the principle of
multiplication. That's how you see God's miracles in your life.

Now in this situation, God could have just rained down bread on these people. He
could have, Jesus could have turned a bunch of stones into bread. He could have
done it any time he wanted to, but instead he did it as he's still doing it so
many times today.

He worked through people. He worked through whoever gave their meal that day in
the group of 4,000. He worked through the disciples who passed it out.

Oftentimes we wait for God to do something for us and what he's wanting to do is
do the miracle through us. What you are waiting for God to do for your marriage,
he often wants to do through your marriage, to bless other people. For your life
as a follower of Jesus, he wants to do through your life.

For your finances, he wants to do through your finances. When you start to see
yourself not as a receiver only, God would you just bless me, but as a channel
of blessing for others, that's when you start to see the greatest miracles in
your life. So you do four things.

You admit, you admit the need, you assess what you already have, you give God
what you have, and then you expect, you expect God to multiply it. Let's pray
for faith right now. Jesus, give us the faith to trust you, to trust you in
those areas of our lives, not just where we seem to have too much, but most
importantly, where it seems to be that we have too little.

We need a miracle and we trust you for that right now. And we start where you
tell us to start, by just coming to you and saying, I have this need. Here is my
need.

So help me to see what I have and then give me the faith. Father, I pray you
would give me the faith to give it to you and to expect you to work through it
in my life and in other people's lives. I pray this in Jesus' name, amen.

Join us next week. We're going to look at Matthew chapter 16. It's the chapter
where you see Peter's greatest affirmation from Jesus and rebuke from Jesus in
the same chapter.

See you next week for Matthew 16.